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Friday, September 4, 2009

Unemployment jumps to 9.7 percent. Most economists believe it will eventually top 10 percent.

The unemployment rate is now the highest since June 1983, and most economists believe it will eventually top 10 percent.

August may be over, but it’s causing one last headache for the Obama administration as the jobless rate jumped up to 9.7 percent, the highest point yet this recession and higher than what economists expected from the monthly report.
Employers cut 216,000 non-farm jobs last month, which was actually slightly fewer job cuts than the consensus prediction, and experts saw other positive signs in the details.
But that’s not what the headlines will say.
“The number that’s going to matter to most people is the unemployment rate, and 9.7 percent is disconcerting,” Mark Zandi, chief economist for Moody’s Economy.com, said on CNBC after the release.
The increase stands as a reminder that despite signs the economy is coming out of the recession, the average American is in for plenty more suffering. Hiring tends to trail the other signs of economic recovery in a recession, and this recession has seen deeper job cuts than previous recessions.